Paper Hearts
by Taliax
Summary: Through a simple gift, Xion strengthens more friendships than she realizes. After all, Valentine's Day doesn't have to be all about romantic feelings.


**A/N: Unseasonal Valentine's Day fic is unseasonal. XD But yeah, I got this plunny, so here it is. All the "pairings" in this are platonic, except for people randomly hitting on Larxene. *sweatdrop***

"What a ridiculous notion," Saïx scoffed. Xion rubbed her eyes and yawned, wandering into the Grey Area later than she usually did, but right on time to hear Demyx's whining.

"Come on, it's _Valentine's Day! _Have a heart!"

"Number IX, your puns were not amusing the first time, much less the seventh."

Demyx caught sight of Xion and eagerly dragged her into the argument. "Hey, Xi! Don't you think X-Face should give us a day off for Valentine's?"

Xion blinked, tilting her head sideways in a way that resembled a puppy. "Is Valentine's a type of Heartless?"

Demyx couldn't hold back a laugh. "See? This poor kid doesn't even know what Valentine's Day is!" He held Xion in front of him, trying to use her cuteness to his advantage. Saïx, of course, only saw a hooded doll that was more creepy than cute, but he was immune to cute things anyway. "You're depriving her of good life experiences!"

"There will be plenty of time to enjoy such "life experiences" after Kingdom Hearts in completed and we are physically capable of feeling joy."

"…I think you're just being a jerk because you don't have a girlfriend." Demyx grinned smugly. "It's Singles Awareness Day too, y'know."

"I find your theory insulting." Saïx turned his glare-o-meter up a notch, and Xion snuck to a safer spot behind Demyx. "We are _Nobodies. _We have no need of such relationships, and even if we were somebodies, Valentine's Day would by pointless. Its only purpose is to make gullible idiots waste munny on cards and hearts full of disgusting chocolate."

Demyx laughed. "Yeah, you sooo need a girlfriend. Maybe if you didn't act like a werewolf you could pick up one of those three blonde chicks in—"

Saïx shoved a mission brief at Demyx's chest. "Maybe if you weren't standing here wasting time you could be accomplishing your mission."

"But—"

"This discussion is over."

"B-but—"

"Unless you want a Darkside added to your mission."

"…If I don't get Larxene a Valentine's present, she'll kill me. I can't do missions if I'm dead."

Saïx pinched the bridge of his nose. "Since you won't get anything useful done anyway, fine. Expect double missions tomorrow."

"But–!"

Saïx's eyes glowed yellow, and Xion was afraid she might be caught in the crossfire of an imminent Boss Battle. "If I had a heart, my patience would be _very _thin."

Demyx opened a corridor and dragged Xion behind him.

"Wait, I need to get—" They appeared in Demyx's room. "—my mission." Xion frowned. She didn't need any more reasons to be on Saïx's bad side.

"Don't worry, you can make up for it by doing my extra mission tomorrow." Demyx grinned, flopping on his disheveled bed and summoning his sitar. "You owe me for getting you a vacation day."

Xion didn't bother arguing with him right now. "Don't you have to do something for Larxene? So she won't kill you?"

He laughed, accidentally strumming a painful chord. "Pfft, she'd kill me if I _did _try to get her a present. I really messed up last year…"

Xion's eyebrows scrunched together. "So why did you lie to Saïx?" That sounded like suicide to her. Well, except for those times she had to lie to get him to let her and Roxas work together, but Axel had done most of that lying for her, and Axel was smart.

"To get a vacation day, duh."

Xion frowned. "But what about Valentine's Day? Are we supposed to do stuff?"

Demyx sighed and put down his sitar, flopping forward on his stomach and leaning his head over the footboard. "You got a boyfriend?"

Huh? "Well, Roxas and Axel are boys, and they're my friends."

Demyx snorted and rolled over so his head was upside down. "Wow, Xion… two boyfriends, that's impressive!" He went back to laughing loudly.

"Do most people not have that many friends?" Xion asked, puzzled. Most of the other members weren't very friendly; maybe she, Roxas, and Axel really were special. "Am I supposed to do something special for them today?"

Demyx forced himself to swallow his laughter, which made his face look like a bloated pufferfish. "Sure, you could like, get them presents or something. Something with hearts on it," he added, grinning hugely. "Yeah, you should get them hearts. They'd love it."

_Maybe Valentine's Day has something to do with Kingdom Hearts? Like to symbolize when we'll get our hearts back? _ Xion wondered silently. She thought Xemnas would announce something like that; he rambled about Kingdom Hearts in all of their meetings. _But I can't give Roxas and Axel real hearts…_

Her eyes lit up. "I know!" She smiled brightly and opened a dark corridor. "Thank you, Demyx!"

"Uh, great. Have fun."

Demyx summoned his sitar again, but he was laughing too hard to play anything.

XXX

Some old mission briefs were an easy source of paper, but she wasn't sure where to find scissors or colors.

_Axel used scissors in the kitchen to cut up some chicken yesterday, _Xion remembered. They were in the sink, so she washed them off with soap and water before putting them in her pocket. _But what can I use to color?_

She decided to go back to Demyx's room and ask him. He was startled into dropping the bowl of cheese puffs he was trying to balance between the crook of his neck and his pillow. (Where had he gotten them, anyway? She hadn't seen him in the kitchen.)

"Aw, man." He stared at all the cheesy snacks in his bed but made no effort to clean them up.

"What were you doing?" Xion asked.

"Trying to eat and play sitar at the same time." He had orange powder all over his face.

_Was he shoving his face in the bowl? _Xion figured it was probably rude to ask.

"Do you have anything I can color with?" She asked instead.

"Uh…" He left the mostly-empty bowl on his bed and dug through a drawer, tossing out candy wrappers and crumped sheet music and a moldy pizza crust before coming up with a box of crayons. "Hey, I _do _still have these!"

Demyx handed them to Xion, and she smiled. "Thanks. Can I color in here?"

"Sure." He shrugged. "Long as you don't mind my music."

"Your music sounds nice."

Demyx smiled while Xion found a (somewhat) clear spot on the floor and spread out her crayons and paper. "Do you want to make a present for anyone?"

"Nah. Larxene shredded the lyrics for the song I wrote her last year." He strummed quietly on his sitar. "It was probably 'cause I rhymed "savage" and "cabbage"… but seriously, rhyming's hard. And she's the _Savage Nymph, _it's not like I was being insulting."

"…What did you say about cabbage?" Xion couldn't help asking.

Demyx blushed. "I said she tasted better than cabbage."

"…Oh." She wished she hadn't asked. Not knowing anything about kissing, she now had an unpleasant image of the Nocturne licking Larxene's face.

Pushing that gross image away, she took out the black crayon and scribbled out a figure in an Organization coat. It came out more like a dress. _I wish I could draw better, _she thought. _I hope they still like it…_

She added two other coats, then used the peach crayon to fill in the faces, and finally dotted in two sets of blue and one set of green eyes. Oh, and the hair; that was important. It was the only way she could tell herself and Roxas apart. Axel was easier since he was so tall and stick-like and had the only set of green eyes.

Demyx got curious enough to peer over the edge of his bed at her drawing. "Aww, that's cute!"

Xion smiled. "So it's good?"

"Well, it's kinda scribbly…" He saw the disappointment already beginning to cloud her face. "…But yeah, it looks nice."

She smiled again and went back to coloring, adding blue ice cream bars to the paper. Then she surrounded the drawing in a giant pink heart.

Demyx's low music soothed her as she worked, finishing the first heart and moving on to the next. This drawing was almost the same, but now Axel was in the middle of the trio instead of Roxas, and she got better at drawing their hair. They still looked pretty much like red and yellow explosions, though. She sighed, hoping it would be good enough, and enclosed the picture of her and her friends in another bright pink heart.

Now was the hard part: cutting out the hearts. Axel made using the scissors look easy, but they felt so huge and awkward in her small hands, and she couldn't cut in a straight line.

"…Demyx?" She asked tentatively.

"Huh?" He stopped playing and ate one of the wayward cheese puffs. "What's up?"

"Will you help me cut these out?"

"Sure – wait, what are you doing with _those?" _He pointed to her scissors.

"Uh… cutting?"

He cracked up. "Xion, those are _meat _scissors."

"Oh. Is that bad?"

Still laughing, much to Xion's confusion and embarrassment, Demyx fished around in another drawer for a pair of safety scissors. "These should be easier. I'll help you if you still can't do it."

"Thanks." Xion took the much-smaller scissors and went back to work. It was still difficult, but not nearly as awkward. Soon she had cut out the general shapes of the two hearts. The discarded bits of paper melted into the junkpiles on Demyx's floor.

_One for Roxas, and one for Axel…_ She glanced at Demyx, who had gone back to strumming his sitar and occasionally popping a stray cheese puff into his mouth. Taking out a rainbow of crayons, she drew and cut out one last heart.

"Happy Valentine's Day, Demyx." She held out the heart to him, which had a drawing of art supplies, cheese puffs (orange circles), and music notes in the middle.

"Huh—you made one for me?" He grinned, taking the heart.

"You're a boy, and you're my friend too." Xion smiled. "And I wanted to thank you for helping me."

"Aww!~" Demyx ruffled her hair and gave her a tight hug. "Thanks, Xi!"

She blushed modestly. "You're welcome."

He hopped off of his bed and pushed piles of junk off of his dresser until he uncovered a roll of grey tape. Ripping off a strip, he made a loop stick-side-out and stuck the heart to the front of his coat.

"Look, I do have a heart!" He laughed, and Xion giggled.

"Could I use some of that?" Xion asked.

"Sure." Demyx gave her the roll, and she put sticky loops on the backs of the other two hearts.

"Thanks," she said, opening a dark corridor.

"No problem." He grinned. "Happy Valentine's Day, Xi."

XXX

Xion didn't know if it was entirely because of Valentine's Day or not, but the Grey Area was more crowded than usual when she arrived.

"Are you _suuure _you don't wanna give me a present?" Xigbar raised an eyebrow (or maybe it was both; Xion couldn't tell under his eyepatch) at Larxene, grinning as he wrapped an arm around her waist.

She summoned her knives and pressed them to his eyepatch, nearly stabbing holes in it. "I _swear, _if you don't stop getting on my nerves, I will _gorge out _your other eye."

He teleported to her other side, throwing her off balance so that she accidentally leaned against him. "Heh, as if. You barely resisted at all when Waterboy made out with you last year."

"But I fried his sitar, and I'm going to fry your face if you _ever_ mention that again."

"Does playing the video tape of it in high-definition count as mentioning it?"

Larxene's glare looked sharper than her daggers. "I _dare _you."

Xigbar's grin only widened as she whirled around and strutted off, head held high.

"Miss Antennae can't take a joke," he said. Luxord shrugged, shuffling his cards next to him.

"It's difficult to find anyone who appreciates a game on this board," Luxord acknowledged.

"Too bad the only other girl around here is Poppet… Hey, speaking of Poppet!" Xigbar grinned at her, and she backed up a step. "Care to join me and Pokerface for a card game?"

"Uh… no, thanks."

She quickly glanced around at the other members: Zexion and Vexen were discussing some sort of potion, Lexaeus and Xaldin were polishing their weapons, and Saïx stood ominously at the back of the room. _No sign of Axel or Roxas…_

"A third player always makes the game more interesting," Luxord added.

She really didn't want to play games with the two strange older members. "Sorry, I've got… uh, stuff to do."

"Ah, well, deal me in." Xigbar said with a shrug.

Xion had better luck when she corridored to the kitchen, where her friends were simmering sausage.

"…So you mean we're _not _boyfriends?" Roxas asked.

Axel sighed and took his hand from the panhandle long enough to facepalm. _"No, _Roxas, we aren't. At all, ever, in this multiverse or any other."

"And Xion's not our girlfriend?"

"That's what I said. Didn't you get it memorized?"

Xion glanced worriedly between them. "I'm not your friend?"

Their heads jerked to face her.

"Of course we're still friends!" Roxas quickly clarified. "Just not boyfriend and girlfriend."

"But you guys are boys and I'm a girl," Xion said, confused. "Right?"

"Great, now I have to give this whole Life Lesson all over again." Axel sighed.

"Boyfriends aren't the same as 'friends that are boys,'" Roxas said sagely.

Xion frowned in confusion. "They're not? But Demyx said you guys are my boyfriends."

"Great, so Xigbar isn't our only troll." Axel rolled his eyes. "Not that I'm surprised."

"What's a troll?"

"GAH, you two are killing me."

Axel explained the difference between friends and girlfriends and boyfriends, with some input from Roxas since he'd already gotten the lecture. They also gave Xion a clearer explanation of what Valentine's Day was actually about while they were at it.

"Oh. That sounds more like what Saïx said than what Demyx told me."

Axel dumped some chopped zucchini into the pan and mixed it around some more. "Never trust Demyx's take on anything."

"But he helped me make these for you," Xion said, holding up the two hearts. "If you still want them… I'm not sure if it was just boyfriends I'm supposed to give them to. You deserve hearts anyway since you're my friends, but Kingdom Hearts isn't done yet so I couldn't give you real hearts…"

Roxas smiled and stuck his paper heart to his chest. "I like this heart better. I don't have to look inside to see it."

Axel chuckled and shook his head, but he accepted his heart and did the same. "Maybe Demyx isn't such a troll after all. Thanks, Xi."

She smiled. "I drew the three of us and sea-salt ice cream in it, because that's what I think would be in our hearts."

"I think ice cream's in my stomach, not my heart," Roxas said, poking the paper. "But I want you guys to be in my heart."

They both turned to Axel like they expected him to say something equally sappy.

"…It's better than those giant heart-boxes filled with gamble-chocolate that Luxord and Xigbar try to give out every year," Axel smiled and ruffled Xion's hair. "Isn't that right, Roxas?"

He stuck out his tongue. "Definitely. I like Xion's heart _way_ better."

"And I like you guys," Xion said happily.

Still smiling, Axel turned back to his cooking and whispered under his breath, "You two really know how to make me feel like I have a heart…"

"Huh?" Roxas and Xion asked.

Axel thought about brushing off their question like he usually did when they got too close to his "feelings"… But it was Valentine's Day. The official day of the year for saying ridiculously sappy things that would make him look like an idiot.

So he drew them both into a warm hug. "I think you might've given me more than a paper heart. Get _that_ memorized."

As his younger friends hugged him back, he thought of another friend who could use as much of a heart as he could get.

XXX

"Hey, Saï."

Saïx spun around, not used to being snuck up on, only to have something slapped on his chest.

"Happy Valentine's Day." Axel grinned.

"…I'm not going to ask where you came up with this ridiculous idea." Saïx peeled the heart off of his coat.

"Xion. She got it from Demyx, apparently." Axel tapped his own paper heart.

"Your drawing skills haven't improved much," Saïx noted, studying the not-quite-stick-figures of himself, Axel, Roxas, and… who was that black-haired figure? _Xion, I suppose… how does he see it in that form?_

"You're welcome, glad you still care about me and you aren't a heartless jerk like I am," Axel said sarcastically. Saïx turned to the side, still staring at the heart.

"I suppose… it's the best you can do." He sighed. Then he slowly pressed the paper back to his chest, and Axel smiled.

"C'mon, just admit you were lonely without me constantly annoying you," he teased.

"Technically, I do not have the ability to feel loneliness _or _annoyance…"

Axel quirked an eyebrow. Annoyance was about the only emotion Saïx ever faked.

"…But if I had a heart, I would feel glad that you care."

Grinning, Axel pointed to Saïx's paper. "You do have a heart."

Saïx's hard expression softened a little. "Technically."

Axel laughed and clapped a hand on his shoulder. "So, better present than Luxord and Xigbar's gamble-chocolate?"

Saïx grimaced. "I would certainly say so."

Axel snorted. "You didn't eat any this year, did you?"

"Xigbar snuck a toothpaste-filled one into my coffee this morning. I almost choked."

"Heh, he tricked Roxas into eating one that tasted like that dead smell in the basement." Axel smiled sympathetically, though he was also trying to hold back a laugh.

"These holidays always provide excuses for some to make trouble," Saïx muttered. "Demyx and Xion didn't attempt their missions today."

"What?" Xi doesn't skip work. Must've been—"

"Demyx's fault, yes," Saïx finished. "But my point remains."

Axel nudged him with his elbow. "Oi, lighten up, Saï. That's probably how she had time to make these." He tapped his heart.

"That's hardly a substitute for collecting true hearts." Saïx placed a hand over the paper on his chest.

"But?" Axel prompted. Somehow he always knew what Saïx was thinking.

"But it was a thoughtful gesture." A useless gesture, from a logical standpoint, but thoughtful. It had been a while since anyone bothered to do something thoughtful for him. …Though he supposed he only had himself to blame for neglecting Axel's friendship.

"That's what friends are for." Axel smiled. "Besides, I didn't have anything better to do for Valentine's Day. Xigbar called dibs on harassing Larxene this year, so I wasn't gonna press my luck."

"Good. It would've been inconvenient to rescue you like I did two years ago." Saïx almost-smirked.

"Hey, if you weren't being so boring I wouldn't have been bored enough to mess with her in the first place," Axel countered. "And she wasn't as bad then as she is now."

"Probably self-defense from putting up with so much of that nonsense from you and some of the others." Saïx snorted. Not that he could feel sympathetic, or even really understand what Larxene dealt with as the Organization's only female, but he did have an objective view that didn't include marking her as evil or insane.

"That was mostly Demyx's fault; he was the one who wouldn't stop hitting on her until she blew a fuse." Axel laughed. "Oh yeah, I heard you went all 'rawr-romance-will-kick-your-puppies-and-TP-your-lawn' on him this morning."

"I don't believe I used phrasing even vaguely resembling that. I essentially said that it's pointless, particularly in our heartless state."

"So I guess you'd be mad if I promised Jasmine you had a Valentine's present for her…" Axel grinned and Saïx's hand twitched, like it was reflexively trying to strangle someone. "It's probably still light in Agrabah, you've got time."

"Axel-!"

He corridored away before Saïx could do anything about it. Alone again, his blue hair settled down.

_Hmm… It could make missions to Agrabah complicated if I offend her… and there's the fact that she's done our Organization the favor of keeping the citizens away from the marketplace…_

He opened a corridor.

_I don't suppose it would be too difficult to make one of those paper hearts._

**A/N: Yeah, random SaiJaz there at the end. XD**

**The conversation between Axel, Roxas, and Xion about friends being different from boyfriends/girlfriends was inspired by Raberba girl's story "ML".**

**Uh… I'll probably remember some other notes later, but I can't think of any right now.**


End file.
